Ah yet again, the Lord is being so good to me. As some of you may know, I am sorta (understatement) an aviation junkie and an aspiring pilot in training. I have a passion for flight and am marveled by modern aviation. I knew coming on this trip I would be able to fly from continent to continent on some rather large beautiful aircrafts. I’ve taken a 300 passenger Boeing 777 from Los Angeles to Hong Kong (Cathay Pacific) and also a 200 passenger Boeing 767 (Kenya Airways). There are however two big dogs that I have yet to ride on. The former largest commercial plane the Boeing 747 (400 pass.) and the now largest aircraft the Airbus A380 (550 pass.). With time running down and only two long haul flights left, I know my chances were getting limited. I had already found out that we would be flying on a Boeing 767 from Tanzania to India. There goes that opportunity. So that left me with one long haul flight remaining….the flight home to America. I had done some research and it was a definite possibility that we would fly on an A380 straight from New Delhi to New York. Since the A380 is so large, only a few certain airports can handle a beast its size and there aren’t that many in operation. Plus, it only flies exclusive routes that are heavily traveled. So I continued researching the possibilities and it wasn’t looking great. The non-stop Emirates Airlines A380 was much more expensive than other flights. So based on previous WR flights they normally book us on the most economically friendly flights. Why am I so obsessed with this behemoth of an airplane? Well, in the aviation world the A380 is the holy grail of aircrafts. It’s the Mercedes-Benz of the airplane industry. Is it sad that I prayed that we could fly home on ANY A380?
“And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith” Matthew 21:22
We had our month 8 debrief in Nairobi and we were told how we were getting home. We were landing in New York City on August 31st. Ok figured that. We are flying from New Delhi to Frankfurt, Germany for a layover. Cool! Germany! Then from Frankfurt we fly to JFK. Of course I had to ask what airline it was and Scotty our squad leader was like, “I can’t even pronounce it. Lufansa? Luftasa? Oh…Lufthansa!” Huh…didn’t see that one coming. So I knew that the only A380 out of Delhi was on Emirates so that was a bummer. But as the day went by I thought to myself, “I think Lufthansa has an A380 in their fleet.” There are only 5 airlines in the world with an A380 in their fleet. Emirates, Air France, Singapore, Qantas, and Lufthansa. Once I got wind of a slight possibility I called stateside to my Uncle Chad to have him look up what kind of plane it was. I eagerly told him that it might be an A380 and he went to the Lufthansa website and first thing he said was, “Now serving non-stop service to Frankfurt to JFK on the NEW Lufthansa A380.” Boom! That literally made my night. I gave him the flight number to confirm and sure enough it matched up. Once I got internet again I looked up our complete itinerary and the flight from India to Germany is on a Boeing 747! My God has once again seen and heard my heart and has delivered the promise of happiness.
